Athletic gloves have been developed for a wide variety of sports. Some gloves are particularly designed to improve a person's grip on a ski rope handle, club, bat, exercise bar, or similar device. Examples of such grip improving gloves are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,274,616 to Russo; 2,852,779 to Roessler; 3,918,097 to Mlodoch and 5,004,231 to Alread. Other gloves are designed to provide wrist support to prevent excessive flexure of the wrist. One such glove is shown in the patent to Wiggins, U.S. Pat. No. 5,033,119. This patent discloses a glove having two elongated, elastic flaps which wrap around the wrist in opposite directions to provide compression and stabilization of the wrist and hand.
Despite the improvement in athletic gloves in recent years, there continues to be a need for an athletic glove designed particularly for water skiers. One problem in particular that has not been addressed in prior art glove designs is the need to provide compression and support for the muscles in the back of the hand. Because skiers are required to maintain a tight grip on the ski rope handle over extended periods of time, the muscles in the back of the hand tend to tire. Accordingly, support is needed for these muscles to prevent tiring. U.S. Pat. No. 4,701,963 to Overton discloses a glove including a back strap. The function of the back strap is to securely fasten the glove to the user's hand, but does not provide compression and enhanced support for the backhand muscles and wrist.